After the news on J.E. Sawyer thoughts on weapons and skills we got a few comments that i posted at the Interplay message boards.
So the Lead Technical Designer of Fallout3, er, i mean Project Van Buren took some time to discuss those comments.
Here`s a few examples:
Dan:Fallout had a very good system... Why change it?
The Fallout system (At least in Fallout 1) was pretty well balanced, now, you can go and change it, but why?
Sawyer: I don't think it's balanced at all, looking at the weapon stats.
Dan: You have a working system, some tweaking might be in order, but changing it for no apparent reason? I don't see the point.
Sawyer: I honestly think you might need to play Fallout again and see how the weapons break down -- either that or break open a stat book and compare the weapons. The small guns are designed to become obsolete, thus rendering the small guns skill obsolete. Try to think of this from the perspective of playing Fallout 1 for the first time. You don't know where to go to get the .223 pistol as soon as you want it. You don't know all of the patterns for character building that come from playing the game over and over again.
In the past few weeks, a lot of people in the division have been playing Fallout and Fallout 2 again. A lot of them got close to the end of the game and realized that they had made "worthless" characters -- characters that for whatever reason had skills that were ultimately ineffective for dealing with the challenges they faced. Small guns fell into that category for both games. Watching someone fight the master with a small gun, even the .223 pistol, is a sad affair when compared to someone using a plasma rifle (turbo or not).
The .223 autoloader does 20-30 points of standard damage with a 30 range, 5 AP cost. The plasma rifle does 30-65 plasma damage with a 25 range, 5 AP cost. Most armor in the game either has a lower plasma DR and/or a lower plasma DT, Tesla Armor being the notable exception.
If you can explain to me how any of the small guns are as good as their counterparts in energy weapons, I'd like to hear it. Honestly, I don't see how anyone other than a masochist would try to go through the game with small guns only when energy weapons are so clearly superior, side to side. It eventually makes the small gun skill less far useful, overall.
ColJac:they do need 3 categories, just not big, small, and energy...
they need big, small, and huge guns..
Sawyer:I had considered this, but I do think that six combat skills in Fallout is one skill too many. Maybe I'm being overly concerned with that limit.
Locutus:Good idea is with the conventional, plasma and laser weapons range and also with using two guns at the same time.
But the idea with one handed weapons being small guns and two handed being big ones is... well isn't good.
And also using a big gun will mean having both inventory slots occupied. This sucks as hell!
Sawyer: I don't think it really sucks, I think it's just the price you pay for using a heavy weapon. High caliber firearms (other than energy weapons) tend to be bigger guns. Rifles are usually a lot more accurate at range. Miniguns are huge and can level town hall meetings.
Saint_Proverbius: Another thing I find problematic about his approach is that it's too much like a D&D deal. Basically, you have pistols or rifles as your choice. Either you have two handed or one handed weapons instead of a distinction based on a more arbitrary classification.
Sawyer: I'm rarely concerned with how things seem, only how they are. But I don't understand how it's like a D&D. D&D splits up every single weapon into its own proficiency type, and you often have to spend an entire feat just to decently use one weapon. And this distinction is entirely arbitrary because it is designed for convenience. When a player picks up a gun, the second they click on it in inventory, they will know that it is either a small gun (1-handed) or big gun (2-handed). A less arbitrary, more "realistic" approach would be to have skills based off of weapon types like handguns, assault rifles, submachineguns, etc.
And a very important quote from Sawyer again:
If people don't agree with my suggestions, they should feel free to question them. Just having the title of lead tech. designer doesn't make me infallable, nor does it preclude the possibility that a gamer could suggest something worthwhile. |
Я F3 имел ввиду...
